Rock of ageless: Def Leppard guitarist's regimen

The people at the Gerson Institute, even its 90-year-old founder, are suddenly big Def Leppard fans.

Earlier this month, Phil Collen, the longtime guitarist for the iconic band, went to the institute's headquarters in the hip Normal Heights neighborhood of San Diego to deliver a $20,000 donation, most of it raised from the auction of a custom-built guitar. He then played four songs on his acoustic, including "Pour Some Sugar On Me."

For a few minutes, inside the walls of a former Wells Fargo bank branch, the '80s ruled again.

Collen, 54, could have given the money, and lent his name, to just about any nonprofit. But he chose one that fits with his belief that eating a healthy diet can make you feel better, keep illness at bay and live longer. Collen, who has lived in Laguna Hills for the past two decades, became a vegetarian in 1983, just as Def Leppard was rising from hair-metal heroes to pop-crossover superstars. He gave up drinking in 1987, after one too many benders that left him "legless" drunk and blacked out.

There are skeptics

Collen also is untroubled by the Gerson Institute's mixed reputation. The group claims it can help people with serious illnesses, including cancer, through a regimen that includes large quantities of organic fruit and vegetable juice, coffee enemas to help the liver cleanse the body of toxins, and nutritional supplements. The Gerson Therapy has many fervent believers, and the group cites case studies of people who say they've been cured of a range of diseases, including breast and pancreatic cancers. But there's little scientific evidence that the treatments work. Mainstream doctors say the therapy's low-sodium diet can be dangerous for some patients. The larger peril, doctors say, is that truly sick patients will pursue the Gerson regimen while ignoring traditional avenues of treatment that might give them a better shot at survival.

"It doesn't hurt to try," Collen says. "So it's a great thing. It can hurt having chemo. We know that. It can mess you up. Yeah, it can kill and destroy cancer tumors, which it does. But unfortunately it kills a lot of the other stuff with it. So what harm is it to actually eat right?

"Cancer feeds on sugar and salt," he adds. "It thrives on it. It's like you're just literally feeding it. We know that. You go to a hospital, when you come out, they'll tell you. They'll go, 'Well you should exercise and eat leafy greens.' They tell you all this, but we don't listen. We go straight back to the pizzeria, we eat cheese, we eat meat, we eat God knows what. And people just don't listen. ... If you're skeptical, just change your diet. What have you got to lose? And you've got everything to gain."

It's personal to him

This isn't just about one rocker's health. It's personal for the British-born Collen. His father, Kenneth, died of pancreatic cancer in 2004 at age 81. When his father was diagnosed, Collen flew to London and, he says, "actually had the best time with my dad that I'd had in our whole lives" while he tended to him. But the cancer took him quickly. There was nothing to be done.

"If I'd have known about the Gerson Institute back then ... ," Collen says, his voice trailing off. "Just even about what to do."

Collen says he went vegetarian, nearly 30 years ago, on principle. "I gave that up because it was like Jeffrey Dahmer's fridge. I would open it up and go 'Oh my god, there's a dead body in there.'"

His decision gave him an immediate surge of energy. He needed it, just to keep up with one of rock's most popular bands. Collen joined Def Leppard in 1982, replacing guitarist Pete Willis, who was fired for drinking too much. The band was recording the album "Pyromania," which produced a string of hits and set the stage for the wildly successful "Hysteria" album in 1987. The record spawned seven hit singles and sold 20 million copies, vaulting the group, and Collen, to international fame.

Coming to O.C., getting fit

He settled in Orange County, where he lives with his third wife, Helen. He works out ferociously at his home gym, helped by his French trainer, martial-arts specialist Jean Carrillo. Collen went vegan two years ago, and once every few months he and Helen go on fasts in which they consume nothing but fruit and vegetable juices.

Collen almost always performs onstage without a shirt, and when he's told he's unrecognizable in a black shirt that conceals his compact, ripped frame, he laughs. With a double-hooped earring dangling from his left ear, he laments how so many of his friends have assorted health problems that he's avoided.

He heard about the Gerson Institute from the wife of Paul Cook, the legendary drummer for the Sex Pistols who's also the drummer for Collen's side band, Manraze.

"His wife, Jeni Cook, she's a raw-food chef in London. She's 50, and she's got the skin of a 20-year-old, and looks amazing. People go, 'Well, what are you doing? Are you having some kind of treatment?' And she goes, 'Well, I don't eat this, I don't eat that, I juice regularly, I eat as much raw food as I can, and no processed food.' I've actually sat in a room with her when she's eaten processed food, and her eyes start glazing over. It's like she has a reaction against it. So most people don't even know that they're suffering from like an allergy or a symptom. And usually it's because they shouldn't be eating what they're eating. It's kind of poison."

He got the idea to donate a guitar from his friend, a Kansas guitar-maker named Jake Willoughby. A Jackson PC1 model was painted purple, with the visage of an angel. The guitar was christened "Wings," and Collen played it during Def Leppard's summer "Rock of Ages" tour, which stopped at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in June. The guitar sold on eBay for $15,000 to a New Zealand collector, and Collen kicked in another $5,000.

His gift, his performance and the publicity it generated made him more than a rock star at the Gerson offices, where some staff members wore Def Leppard shirts.

"He's an incredible spokesperson for us," said Anita Wilson, the institute's executive director. "We were thrilled, and his passion and his experience with nutrition-based health is very powerful."